Let My New Life Begin.....

It's Sunday night. My house is pretty much put together. My mom left yesterday. Tomorrow it begins. It's time for me to figure what I'm going to do with myself here in Marietta, Georgia. The last two weeks have been so fun, but not representative of real life. Here are some of the pictures I took while my parents were here. My mom has so many cute pictures on her camera, and I had good intentions of taking the ones I wanted. Unfortunately life happened, and I forgot to get them before she left. My dad was a champion while he was here and did all sorts of fix-it projects for us. This picture was taken the morning he left for Utah. Lucy loves her Papa and has asked about him since he left.

We have been exploring some of the local Atlanta tourist sites. Here we are at the World of Coke. I wasn't the biggest fan of waiting in line for everything, but I did love the room at the end where you got to sample as much soda from around the world as you like.

We also ate at the original 'Varsity' diner. The counter where you order is forever long, and women wearing varsity hats yell, "Whaddya have??" Quite the experience.

Lucy sporting the Varsity hat.

We bought passes to the zoo and the aquarium as well (and guest passes for when y'all come to visit :) Both places were fantastic and we can't wait to go back. Lucy had a great time feeding the birds at the zoo.

Jordan has been gone the last week and half in D.C. for training. He is officially a working man. We missed him like crazy when he was gone.

Lucy was so excited to see him when he came home that she just fell to the floor. She just wanted to "snuggle with daddy."

One of my favorite things that we did was visit a small town called Sanoia, which came highly recommended by my friend, Meagan Day. Sanoia's main street is lined with little antique and home decor shops. I was in heaven! I found all sorts of great finds for our house.

Just look at these shops! This is definitely one of the places I will take people when they come to visit.

We stopped in a cupcakery to get Lucy a cake pop. She was thrilled.

I think she looks so grown-up in this picture.

Many movies have been filmed in Sanoia including "Driving Miss Daisy", "Fried Green Tomatos", and the new "Footloose". Lots of celebrities visit as well. The day we were there, security swept through the town because Oprah was coming for dinner.

Love.

Since Jordan has been gone, I have been doing more "projects" than I used to including painting, yardwork, and assembling furniture. My mom bought Lucy a cute table and chairs set online and these are the instructions that came with them. Now, I had just recently put together some extremely complicated bedside tables from Target and was feeling pretty confident in my ability to assemble furniture. I opened the box to discover that all the many little pieces of hardware had been haphazardly thrown into the box, and these SUPER helpful instructions. No, the picture is not blurry. It has just been photocopied so many times that you can't make out any details. I had no idea what hardware went where. Needless to say, there was a point in which I almost broke one of the chairs over my knee in frustration.

After a few hours......ta da!!!

To say that I was sad when my mom went home would be an understatement. She was the hardest good bye of all. It was so wonderful to have her hear to shop, cook, watch movies, and paint with. I ended up with an awful case of strep throat last week and I don't know what I would have done if she hadn't been here. Now that she has gone home I feel like my buffer is gone, and now I really have to start living my life. Wish me luck!

The Moving Post....

On the morning of Christmas Eve we loaded a 16 foot moving van with everything we own. Here is our life in boxes.

Jordan and I had worked hard to make sure everything was boxed and ready for loading, so it only look an hour and fifteen minutes to load everything.

We were lucky to have so many strong helpers show up to help us load including two of my brothers, two of Jordan's, and our dads.

Doesn't Clark scream manliness in this picture?

Jordan's dad worked in the moving business for many years, so it was nice to have a professional mover directing things.

The moving crew.

After a wonderful Christmas Eve and Christmas day, we went to bed early. At 5:30 AM we woke up and loaded our bags in the car. After tearful good byes with our families, we gave final hugs and then started our long drive to Atlanta. Jordan and my dad drove the moving van, and my mom, Lucy and I followed in our minivan. My parents gave Lucy this cute neck pillow for the drive. She wore her bear constantly.

We had only been on the road a few hours when we stopped for gas in Wyoming. As the van was filling up, these people backed up right into the Civic. What a great way to start our trip, eh? After exchanging insurance information we were on our way again.

We packed LOTS of movies for Lucy. She was surrounded with all her favorite things. Her tag quilt, her Dumbo, and her movies.

The first night we stopped in Denver to stay with Mike and Erin and the kids. They just bought a beautiful new home, so it was fun to see their new place. My parents brought Christmas presents for the kids, so we had a mini Christmas celebration.

Mike made some bangin' philly cheesesteak sandwiches for us.

Abbie's birthday is on the 31st, so we had an early birthday celebration for her. The kids had a great time playing together. It was so nice to stay with family instead of a hotel that night.

The next morning we were up early again and back on the road by seven. The second day was by far the longest. We drove 14 hours through Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, and spent the night in Illinois. Lucy was a fantastic little traveler. She had a few moments where she was tired of being in her carseat, but she was cheerful the rest of the time. One of our family friends had sent her with a little backpack full of wrapped presents. I had also bought a bag full of little wrapped presents, and we used these to keep her entertained. Every time she started getting restless we let her open another present. Worked like a charm.

The third day we drove for nine hours through Kentucky, Tennessee, and finally.......Georgia.

1,877 miles, 30 hours, and 9 states later we were finally home.

That night we ate dinner at Aaron and Haley's house. My Aunt Jolayne and my cousin Janel and her family were in town, so it was great to catch up with them. We spent the night in a hotel, and then got up early again to do a walk-through of the house. That afternoon we closed on the house, and then it was move-in time.

My cousin Aaron, Janel's husband Derek, Jordan, and my dad managed to unload everything in less than an hour and a half. That's when the craziness began. Jordan, my dad, and I drove all over Atlanta to pick up some need appliances while we still had the moving truck. For the next eight hours we drove around buying a refrigerator, washer and dyer, shelves from Ikea, odds and ends from Home Depot, and the modem we needed for internet. We found our fridge at the Sears Outlet. We saved $1300 dollars on the fridge because it had a small dent on the freezer door. I love that dent.

The next few days continued to be crazy. The walls were not in great shape when we moved in, so we spent hours patching the walls, sanding, and painting. Remember that horribly ugly wallpaper border in our master bedroom? I spent five hours scraping away that nasty border in preparation for some new paint. We painted our room a light gray, Lucy's room pink, and touched up the paint in the hallway and living room. We also got all of our boxes unpacked and have been organizing and fixing things as we go. One night, my dad took everyone to dinner at a great Thai place in downtown Marietta. It was great to relax and decompress a little. This moving business is stressful!

Aaron and Haley have twin boys and a six year old daughter that Lucy has been acquainting herself with. It's been fun to see the kids play together.

After we finally got the kitchen cleaned out and everything put away, my mom and I cooked in my kitchen for the first time. I felt all grown up.

On New Year's Eve, Lucy came down with a horrible case of hives. I wouldn't have been too concerned but the hives were inside her mouth as well and we worried about her airway closing off. We drove to the nearest children's hospital in downtown Atlanta, and waited 30 minutes in the parking lot of the E.R. because we didn't have insurance until January 1st. Turns out everything was fine and they gave Lucy some Benadryl and sent us home. It was an expensive dose of Benadryl, but at least I know where the children's hosptial is now. Jordan started work yesterday, and has been flown to Virginia for a week and a half of training. Luckily we have enough to keep us busy until then. My dad flew home yesterday, but my mom will stay with me until the 13th. She is a LIFESAVER. She has been watching Lucy for me round the clock while I work on the house. My dad was so helpful too. He is Mr. Handyman and managed to fix up all sorts of things for us while he was here. Lucy and I have come down with some yucky form of the flu, and took it pretty easy today. I'm so glad my mom is still here. I will post pictures of the house when it's a little more "put together". Hope you all had a wonderful New Year's.

The Christmas Post...

What a crazy couple of weeks. Before I post anything about the move, I figured I better document that Christmas actually happened this year. We spent the weeks before Christmas preparing for the move, and packed our moving van on the morning of Christmas Eve. Needless to say, Christmas shopping was not the foremost thing on my mind. One nice thing about moving at Christmas time is that everyone gathers to celebrate the holiday, which makes it easy to say good bye to large groups of people that you love. While it was hard to say good bye to everyone, some good byes were particularly difficult. Our aged grandparents definitely fit this category. We were able to spend the evening of the 23rd with my Hale grandparents. We took LOTS of pictures.

After spending the morning of Christmas Eve loading the moving van, Jordan and I headed out for some last minute shopping. That evening we had dinner with Jordan's family and then Grandpa Parker read the Christmas story from the bible. It was hard to say good bye to Grandma and Grandpa Parker as well.

We then went to my parent's house for a Christmas Eve devotional. First, Papa read "The Night Before Christmas".

Then we sort of acted out the nativity. By this time Lucy was pretty tired, so she only lasted a few minutes.

Then, things just got a little silly. Steve looks more like a terrorist than a shepherd.

Then we hung our stockings for Santa Claus. Special delivery for Scott and Rachel!

Christmas day was wonderful. We started opening presents at the Walkers at 7:00.

Emma and Abbi were excited. Lucy was grumpy. She perked up considerably when she realized that the wrapped packages were new toys for her.

My mother-in-law, Kathy, managed to surprise me with the best gift.....a sewing machine!! I have wanted one forever, and am so excited to try it out.

The girls all got matching pink arm chairs. They had a great time watching their new movies in their chairs.

We ate a traditional ebelskever pancake breakfast at Walkers and then went back to my parents for round two of present opening.

Adelaide was mostly interested in playing jingle bells.

Jordan and I decided that with all of the expenses we would be incurring with the new house, we would just give each other one gift this Christmas. Jordan has stacks of old t-shirts that no longer fit him, however, he can't get rid of them because of their "sentimental value". I decided that this would be a great year to make them into a t-shirt quilt. My friends, Bethany and Lindsey helped me every step of the way. For the last month I have been telling Jordan that I was having "girl's nights" while we furiously worked on his quilt. I have never been so excited to give a gift in my whole life. In addition to the t-shirts he already owned, I went to his elementary school and junior high to find old t-shirts so that every school he went to would be represented. He loved his quilt.

Christmas aftermath.

After opening presents we went to church. I love Christmas sacrament meeting. It was great to have Christmas on Sunday so we could focus on the Savior.